Detectives Should Record Interviews, Police Say

Locally and nationally, experts say, police routinely tape-record or videotape their interviews with suspects or get a written and signed statement.

Without that, "it leaves too many avenues for questions and insinuations," said James City County Deputy Police Chief Ken Middlebrook.

Middlebrook and Williamsburg Deputy Police Chief Dave Sloggie - who head up investigations in their respective agencies - said they encourage detectives to always try to videotape interviews in the most serious cases.

"Good documentation can help eliminate questions about whether someone said something," Sloggie explained. "It can be more persuasive to a jury. The more you can document the facts, the better. Whether video, audio or the written word, it can do nothing but help you get to the truth."

He's also discovered that videotape can be very helpful in the investigation itself. "In a videotape, it's amazing how you can watch and actually hear things you didn't hear the first time."

Not that there aren't exceptions, both police leaders stressed. If they were interviewing someone at the jail, for example, they couldn't use the video equipment available at the police station, Sloggie said. But they would at least try to tape it or get a written statement, he said.

Occasionally, a suspect refuses to sign a statement or seems so "hinky" that an investigator thinks if he pulls out a pencil and paper the suspect will clam up, Middlebrook said.

In misdemeanor cases, Sloggie said, it's perfectly acceptable to just have the officer's own statement about what the suspect said. In a felony case, however, he said, if there's no taped or written statement, he's going to be asking why.

Bill Geller - a former associate director of the national Police Executive Research Forum who now runs a Chicago consulting firm that advises police departments and government leaders on crime and law enforcement issues - said he conducted a U.S. Justice Department study on this subject 10 years ago. On the basis of that study, he predicted that well over half of all law enforcement agencies in the country would be videotaping interviews during the '90s. He said it was extremely rare for agencies to reply to his survey that they didn't even do written statements.

Police methods have improved a lot over the years, from coercive interrogation practices that used to be legal to requirements that suspects be read their Miranda rights and now, in a growing number of agencies, audiotaped or videotaped statements, Geller said. But the practice of getting suspects to write - or at least sign - a statement has been around since there have been quills, he said.

"I would be very, very skeptical of the professionalism of the police work if its routine practice is not to document suspect statements," he said.

Maj. Ron Montgomery of the York County Sheriff's Office said investigators there usually videotape if they interview a suspect at the office, which has an interview room set up for that purpose. But how the statement is documented depends a lot on where the interview takes place and the particular circumstances, he said.

He said the department has no policy about it, and it is left entirely to the investigator's discretion.

Asked if a lack of objective proof of what the suspect said doesn't leave the case significantly more vulnerable, Montgomery responded with a question of his own: "How many times have you heard that police have a signed confession and the defense attorney screams it was coerced?" In other words, he said, defense attorneys will always find something to challenge about a confession because that's their job. In the end though, it's not about a defense attorney's allegations, but what a jury decides.

Patti Rosenberg can be reached at 229-5751 or by e-mail at prosenberg@dailypress.com